Branded by Fire

aim. “You never answered my question.”

“What?”

“Whether you’re running from us because you don’t think you can handle me.”

“I did answer it. I said I didn’t have time.”

“Chicken.” Said as they came within hearing distance of the men and women guarding the house.

Mercy’s mouth fell open. Surely she’d heard wrong. Surely solid, staid, stick-in-the-mud Riley Aedan Kincaid had not dared her by calling her a chicken?! “What did you say?”

“You heard.” He greeted the four others who’d joined Monroe and Owen. Two of them were wolves.

Monroe walked over. “I saw nothing under the house that could’ve been used to pipe gas into the home, but I’ll make sure the techs recheck,” he told them. “Thing is, Owen does some sharpshooting—he says if you were good enough, you might be able to get some sort of gas pellet through the little vent in the bathroom.”

“That vent is tiny,” Mercy muttered.

Riley made a sound of disagreement. “I know two men who could do it.”

Dorian and Judd. Nodding, she glanced at Monroe. “Tell the techs to pay extra attention to that area when they arrive.” Raising her voice, she held up a hand. “Owen and Monroe, stay on the house. Rest of you—with us.”

Mercy hit pay dirt barely five minutes into the search. She knocked on the door of a small cottage with frilly curtains and a garden so neat that no weed would dare show its head, and found herself being scrutinized by a tiny woman with such strength of will in her that it fairly pulsed in the air. Bright brown eyes looked Mercy up and down. “So, you tumbled that wolf you were with?”

Mercy was too much a pack animal to take offense at the personal question. She grinned. “How did you know it was me?”

“Do I look senile to you?” Not waiting for a response, she continued. “I was coming out to you, but you took off too fast.”

Every sentinel instinct came on alert. “You saw something?”

For an answer, the woman picked up a piece of paper from a table beside the door and shoved it at Mercy. “Registration number of the van that was parked here for much too long—I knew they were up to mischief.”

“Did you call Enforcement?”

“ ’Course I did.” A pause. “Got a nephew in there. Good kid. He says it was off a stolen vehicle. But I wrote down the description of the van, too.”

Mercy was already pulling out her cell to get the DarkRiver techs onto surveillance.

“So?” her informant prompted before she could code in the call.

“Yes,” Mercy said. “And I’m not doing it again.” If she kept telling herself that, maybe her traitorous body would actually notice and shut up with its demands.

The older woman gave her a sour look. “Damn shame. What, you like them prettier?” A snort. “In my day, we liked men who looked like men.”

Mercy had no chance to reply, finding the door shut in her face. Everyone was a critic today. And coming on top of Riley’s “chicken” taunt, it didn’t put her in the best of moods. But the tech answered then and she gave him the info. He promised to get back to her the second they had anything.

Riley was waiting for her by the curb, explaining how the old lady knew what he looked like. “Get anything?”

The woman’s words in her mind, she ran her eyes over him as she shared the intel. He definitely looked like a man, she thought, all hard and solid and rough. Strength, there was incredible strength in Riley. Which made the gentleness of his hold as he’d gotten that thorn out of her foot all the more extraordinary.

She knew what he’d been up to with those cracks of his. Damn wolf had been looking after her. And he’d done it right. Even now, the leopard didn’t know quite what to make of it, so she concentrated on the hunt. “It’s a good lead.”

“There’s something wrong with this,” Riley muttered, rubbing at a jaw that already bore the faint shadow of afternoon stubble. “That chip tells us this was an elite Alliance force, but why would they leave the evidence behind if they’re so organized? And being so careless with the van?”

“You thinking the chip could be a plant?”

He looked down the street, as if seeing what had happened the night before. “I had a call from Lucas while you were talking with your informant—Nash’s professor says he’s being courted by several Psy firms.”

Mercy blinked. “Psy are very, very insular. Especially with R & D. Why would they want a changeling?”

“A gifted changeling. Nash’s apparently a genius in nanotech. And we both know the Council is missing two of its top technical scientists.”

Mercy blew out a breath between her teeth. “The Implant Protocol crashed and burned with Ashaya’s broadcasts.” That protocol had been meant to turn the individuals of the PsyNet into a true hive mind, interconnected and seamless.

“Yeah, but what if someone’s got the idea to keep it on the back burner for the future?” He shrugged. “It’s a theory.”

“But if you’re right, either the Psy took Nash and pinned the blame on the Human Alliance, or—”

“The Alliance took him and did a sloppy job.”

Mercy rubbed her forehead. “Or we could be screwing ourselves up by making this too complicated.”

“I guess we’ll find out when we find Nash.”

She jerked up her head, hearing a very dangerous thread in his voice. “Hey, cut that out. We’re in a human neighborhood.”

The eyes that looked at her weren’t brown anymore. “And this is wolf territory.”

“Leopard and wolf.” She refused to back down under that predatory gaze, though it chilled her to the soul. She’d never seen Riley lose it like that. And so rapidly. “What flipped your lid?”

“If Nash is hurt, Willow’s going to blame herself for not being able to help her brother.”

Oh. “He won’t be—he’s a predatory changeling. We’re not easy to kill.” She made her voice as arrogant as she could. “Now, pull yourself out of that slobbering mess of self-pity and get with the program. This isn’t about you.”

Riley stared at her with those cold wolf eyes, a rich amber that held pure menace. “One day,” he said calmly, “your mouth is going to get you into more trouble than you can handle.”

CHAPTER 10

Mercy felt a whisper of relief brush across her face. She was confident she could hold off Riley in a real fight long enough for help to arrive, but if he truly went wolf on her, there was a high chance he’d kill her. Unless she cheated. Which, in a fight to the death, she absolutely would. Sometimes, it wasn’t about strength, it was about intelligence. “Oh?” she said, and very deliberately ran the tip of her tongue over her upper lip.

Riley sucked in a breath and the wolf was gone between one heartbeat and the next. “Using sex to distract me?”

“Whatever works.” Oddly enough, much as she liked to piss him off, she didn’t like to see Riley hurting. Not over this. He’d gone through hell when Brenna had been abducted. So now, she grinned and said, “Plus, I know you’re going to be tormented by that image the rest of the day.”

To her surprise, Riley’s lips curved. Just a little. Just enough to make her stomach dive. “So, you want to play, kitty cat?”

“Men.” A disdainful snort, but Riley saw the flash of something richer, hotter, far more enticing in those changeable leopard eyes. Good. Because this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

“Can we get back to work now?” An arch question.

No one ever talked to him like Mercy. If he hadn’t had her all but purring for him only a night ago, he’d have imagined she didn’t know how. “There’s not much more we can do at this stage.” He thought over their options.